What's old is new —

Cupertino’s photocopiers: What iOS 7 borrowed from Android

The resemblance is uncanny.

This piece has drawn a significant reaction from the Ars audience. We've got a counterpoint piece by Aurich Lawson that you can read here!

Reactions to yesterday’s iOS 7 reveal were largely positive, but one current of criticism kept flowing: that Apple may have relied a little too hard on copying other operating systems—in particular, Google’s Android (though the stark flatness of Windows Phone 8 got cited, too).

Let's leave aside the question of intention; certainly some iOS elements appear to be influenced by other mobile operating systems, which has been a natural part of OS design for decades. What the new iOS design does show is validation for the direction in which Android and Windows Phone 8 have been moving recently. Now, the three top mobile operating systems favor clean, simplified, visual interfaces.

Apple's choices may also come as a validation for Android engineers, who have had to deal with the legions of OEM interface layovers and fragmentation issues that plague the OS and undermine what they have attempted to standardize. For many—including me—stock Android is a favorite, and it appears that might be true at Apple, too. When you put both Android 4.2 Jelly Bean and iOS 7 side-by-side, the resemblance can be uncanny. Let's take a look.

Hello flatness, my old friend

iOS 7's minimalist interface is certainly good-looking, but I couldn't help but see the Android similarities as I was watching Apple's WWDC keynote.

Apple dialed down its lock screen to a very simple “slide to unlock” variant that mirrors what Android has going on with Jelly Bean. You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, which appears styled like Android's, and the date and time are also similarly placed, with a similar font.

The multitasking screen also seems to take a few cues from Android. There are only minor differences between the two: the icon placement and the fact that the preview screens are horizontal rather than vertical.

Settings shades

Apple’s new Control Center is a panel that you can swipe up from the bottom of the screen to access many quick settings like airplane mode, screen brightness, and Bluetooth. You can also select from a listing of commonly used apps. This is much more user-friendly than the ordeal accessing the settings used to be—pausing whatever you're doing by double tapping the home button and then navigating to the settings—and it’s a lot like the expanded settings panel that Google introduced in Jelly Bean.

And if we’re bringing up previous transgressions, Apple introduced its Notifications shade long after Google had implemented something similar into Android.

Full-screen mobile browsing

There’s a reason we pay such close attention to the Chrome Beta browser for Android—that’s where Google tries out its features. Earlier this year, Google showed its users that it was going to bring full-screen browsing to the mobile version of Chrome, which it eventually did with the latest update. Apple also announced yesterday that it would implement full-screen browsing in mobile Safari.

I'm not sure how Apple does its full-screen browsing since I haven't gotten to use iOS 7 myself, but Google Chrome only does so once you start scrolling down; otherwise, the omnibar and refresh button remain in place.

The similarities don't stop there—especially if we start talking about actual application features. iOS 7 remains a beta product, and some of this may change; even if it does, though, Android users might feel a little déjà vu next time they borrow an iPhone.

The lockscreen is more/less identical to every iOS lockscreen since the iPhone debuted. The App Switcher more closely resembles previous iOS App Switchers than it does Android's implemention, same with the Music Player. I wouldn't say there aren't any design influences between the two devices but these aren't particularly compelling examples. I see more resemblance to Windows Phone than I do Android, personally.

Actually i never feel so happy to get iOS than now with iOS 7. It looks really great and the feature that really want to test is the blocking call. I am tired of these damn telemarketing bullshit calls.

To be fair, I think there are a lot of common design cues that most mobile UI designers like these days. For instance, the BB Music application looks similiar as well. Flat buttons, a big display of the album art. There aren't a whole lot of places to go with that.And full screen browsing is a non-sequiter.edit: added reference images

"Apple dialed down its lock screen to a very simple “slide to unlock” variant that mirrors what Android has going on with Jelly Bean. You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, just like on Android, and the date and time are also similarly placed."

You are joking right?

Effectively, you are saying, "look, Apple displays the time and date, obviously copying Android." Really?

Yes, there are some visual similarities with iOS 7's new visual style and Android or Windows Phone (more this). And yes, there is no doubt that Apple co-opted notifications.

But to say Apple displaying battery life on the lockscreen is copying Android is seriously reaching. To make such an absurd argument verges on fanboyism or astroturfing. Or someone that knows nothing about iOS, Android, or the history of both OSes. Or the history of cell phones, since they have had battery indicators since forever.

What would be really interesting would be to see iOS6 vs iOS7 vs Android vs Windows Phone. Things like the app switcher, for instance, are way more like WP than Android. And some elements are really just re-colored versions from iOS6 (which hardly amounts to "stole from Android").

I don't "see" that much identicality. They all show icons, text, images...so what? Certainly not "uncanny"; similar at best.

I came from old Unix and IBM 3270/5250 green screens and still wish I had an easy accessible CLI to my phone. I saw the original Mac in 84 and asked the shiny Apple geek "how do I actually DO anything on this hot mess?" or words to that effect.

I've owned a ton of mobile phones and none are that great. I have an iPhone and an HTC. The most used is the iPhone because it doesn't crash or grind to a halt as often. That said, IOS 6 is a pig and it doesn't sound like 7 will help that a bit. I'd bet my 4S will not be anything close to 'snappy' after 7 drops.

Well, down voters, I just showed the pics to my sweetie, who is not tech savvy at all (her statement).

She says you're smoking crack...the images are nowhere close to uncanny.

You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, just like on Android, and the date and time are also similarly placed.

There's definitely some cross-pollination going on here, but the placement of the date and time and (as others have already pointed out) the battery indicator seem like weird choices for exemplars. None of these things has changed.

Yeah, much more in common with Jailbreak tweaks than Jellybean - now, perhaps some of those tweaks were nabbed from previous versions of Android, but there's more to relate to in Cydia than in Android.

"Apple dialed down its lock screen to a very simple “slide to unlock” variant that mirrors what Android has going on with Jelly Bean. You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, just like on Android, and the date and time are also similarly placed."

You are joking right?

Effectively, you are saying, "look, Apple displays the time and date, obviously copying Android." Really?

Yes, there are some visual similarities with iOS 7's new visual style and Android or Windows Phone (more this). And yes, there is no doubt that Apple co-opted notifications.

Between 6 and 7, and the main difference is they dropped the big battery and the chrome. From 3.1 to 6, completely identical except for pixel resolution and my 3.1 device doesn't have any radio icons to show.

Reading people who are clearly ignorant of design try to pick apart design — when what they're really interested in is attacking what they don't like — is very funny. There are some really good critiques of the graphic design of iOS 7 today, but random users who don't understand design don't have a clue what they're talking about.

Yeah the music player is a total ripoff of Android, what with the track forward, track backward, and play/pause buttons ... Yeahhhh You have to have been really reaching to fill out this piece. Anyway, since when did Ars produce vacuous flamebait "articles"?

You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, just like on Android, and the date and time are also similarly placed.

Uh, might want to look at where the battery and date/time were in iOS 1.0 (way back when it was still iPhoneOS).

I think you're reaching with most of your example here. To me, iOS 7 looks like an amalgamation of several trends in mobile UI, not an attempt to directly ape any one platform. (With the exception of the multitasking UI, which is a straight-up rip from WebOS, right down to the "flick cards up to close" metaphor.)

You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, just like on Android, and the date and time are also similarly placed.

That's where it's always been placed in iOS...

I think that it would be more appropriate to show an old version of iOS alongside the new version and any other platforms the new version seems to be inspired from. Despite large visual differences, iOS 7's greatest inspiration is iOS 6, excluding it from the discussion makes it look like they copied everything, even if some of those elements were already in iOS first (and possibly copied by the other platforms).

Apple drew a ton of inspiration from Windows Phone and Android for sure, as have they has also done from iOS and other OS's, but it's a little misleading to imply that Android dictated the location of the battery life indicator on the lock screen. Showing the previous version of iOS and discussing what elements they kept, what elements they changed and what elements drew inspiration from other operating systems would have resulted in a more balanced, informative, and less click baity article.

You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, just like on Android, and the date and time are also similarly placed.

There's definitely some cross-pollination going on here, but the placement of the date and time and (as others have already pointed out) the battery indicator seem like weird choices for exemplars. None of these things has changed.

I should have specified that the battery indicator and font style looks much more similar to Android than before.

You can check on your battery life up in the right-hand corner, just like on Android, and the date and time are also similarly placed.

There's definitely some cross-pollination going on here, but the placement of the date and time and (as others have already pointed out) the battery indicator seem like weird choices for exemplars. None of these things has changed.

I should have specified that the battery indicator and font style looks much more similar to Android than before.

You mean the font is a true Helvetica instead of the bastard that is Roboto?

Hmmm wonder how my family members will take the ios redesign. Personally I like jellybeans UI and have had very few complaints with it. It looks good, is easy to use, and doesn't get in my way. Now all the crap the OEMS and phone carriers pile on top of it are a different matter, but I mostly stick to the nexus devices.